a girl in her city, watching the sunset

Archive for the day “January 6, 2013”

I had a bizarre and disturbing dream. I was crossing a street and was hit by a car. I became paralyzed and couldn’t walk any longer.

I woke hyperventilating and crying.

It occurs to me that I’m quite proud of being as ambulatory as I am. The follow up consideration is that I’d like to get rid of that. Not the ambulatory bit, the pride.

Of late, I have been aware of how very little I actually need. Four months into unemployment, I have pared down a weekly ledger that usually exceeded $400 to one that is routinely less than $100. I eat and drink coffee and smoke cigarettes. I keep trying to quit smoking. It doesn’t work. Friday, I splurged on a jacket and a dress and that totaled around $12. Not big bucks, I don’t think, however you dice it. I was at the market later and tried to think of something special to get, to celebrate, but I wandered the aisles and checked out, having saved almost twice what I spent. I tried to talk myself into something chocolate, or a can of almonds or fancy mustard. I wasn’t depressed, I just couldn’t find a reason past buying things for the sake of buying.

I want to work. I want super a lot to work. I miss working. As calm and un-bothered as my schedule is, I am ill-at-ease. I have the hardest fucking time concentrating. I haven’t written much of substance in weeks, though I keep planning to do it, my plans dissipate. I don’t lack ideas, I am amassing an embarrassing amount of notes that would mean sfa to anyone else, but they are not finishing shit. It’s not only about lacking creation. Without creating anything, my confidence as an author is going to hell. Am I a writer? It’s said that if you write, you’re a writer. Stalling is frustrating that identification. I understand Virginia Woolf’s assertion that a woman needs a room of her own and a bit of spending money. I grok that so hard. I don’t need nearly anything. Where do I apply for the job where someone says, “here’s your rent paid and wine and meat and coffee and Camel 99s; here’s fifty bucks to blow every week at Sheddy’s; here’s a bus pass for a month. Write some good shit.” Where is this job?

So, that’s a long way around to say I’d like to disabuse myself of the notion that I need my legs. Maybe better put this way: I would like to learn how to accept, with a modicum of grace, that if I even if I couldn’t use my legs, I’d still be O.K.